What made Spatz work so well was it's characters. Despite having a relatively large cast for such a simple concept, each character was extremely unique. There was: TJ Strickland, the Chanlder Bing type "manager" who couldn't say boo to a goose. Karen - the Eurpoean Co-ordinater who believed the only way to run a successful business was to shout as loudly as possible, treat the staff like dirt, and insult people on a regular basis. Dexter - the cool dude who who had great ambition and wanted to make it to the top, but by doing as little work as possible in the process. Vince, the cheeky chappy who always got into trouble. Stanley - thick as mince. Debbie - the sensible one of the group but was easily badly influenced. Toni - looked down her nose at the job and left to achieve greater things. Lilly - wanted to keep her head down and get on with things but always got caught up in the commotion. Jo - cheeky trouble maker who often teamed up with Vince. And Freddy - Jo's replacement who was equally cheeky and always had a story to tell.
While the situations that the staff landed themselves in each week were always amusing, what made them so funny was that in every case each character remained true to themselves, and always reacted by doing something that was fitting to their character as opposed to what would just be a funny thing to do. In turn this made it even funnier, and eventually some catch phrases and long running gags were established such as:
Karen never getting anyone's name right. The more angry Karen got, the more TJ wound her up with unfunny jokes. Debbie's engagement to a guy called Derek which she was constantly calling off. Freddy having a superstitious Scottish legend to tell for every occasion (Such as the Legend of the Great Hairy Bogey.) Dexter continuously sucking up to Karen with no success. Customers constantly being ignored or mistreated because they were getting in the way of good story lines!
This show was very well written, and while it was ultimately a children's show, some of the humour, especially between TJ and Karen could be quite adult at times. And as someone already mentioned, you could cut the sexual tension with a knife.
While the situations that the staff landed themselves in each week were always amusing, what made them so funny was that in every case each character remained true to themselves, and always reacted by doing something that was fitting to their character as opposed to what would just be a funny thing to do. In turn this made it even funnier, and eventually some catch phrases and long running gags were established such as:
Karen never getting anyone's name right. The more angry Karen got, the more TJ wound her up with unfunny jokes. Debbie's engagement to a guy called Derek which she was constantly calling off. Freddy having a superstitious Scottish legend to tell for every occasion (Such as the Legend of the Great Hairy Bogey.) Dexter continuously sucking up to Karen with no success. Customers constantly being ignored or mistreated because they were getting in the way of good story lines!
This show was very well written, and while it was ultimately a children's show, some of the humour, especially between TJ and Karen could be quite adult at times. And as someone already mentioned, you could cut the sexual tension with a knife.